Palgrove, unscrewing the whiskey bottle, glanced to see Love’s round stare of admiration. “Hundred and eighty quid, this little number,” he said.
When drinks had been poured, Palgrove handed one to the inspector and carried his own to the fireplace, where he remained standing. He took several sips of the whiskey, licked his mouth carefully—appreciatively, too, Purbright thought—and set the glass on the mantelpiece beside one of a pair of china storks that must have been nearly two feet high. Then he said: “The funeral—I’ve been wondering about the funeral. You know...”
“You can go ahead with the preliminary arrangements. Sergeant Malley will be in touch with you about the inquest. You’ll find him very helpful.”
“Inquest—that’s necessary, is it?”
“I’m afraid so, sir. Unless, of course, it turns out that your wife’s doctor was seeing her regularly and confirms the post-mortem findings. Then he’ll issue his certificate, I’ve no doubt.”
Palgrove remained silent. During the pause, Purbright did some mental moulding on his next question.
“There is one possibility that the coroner is always required to examine when anything like this happens: I suppose you realize what that is, sir?—oh, a very remote possibility, certainly, but it has to be disposed of.”
Palgrove’s incredulous stare wavered after the first few seconds, as if it might turn to laughter. “Good God, man! Who’d want to murder poor old Henny?”
The inspector frowned. “I wasn’t thinking of murder, sir.”
“Sorry. My mistake.”
“The question I had in mind was whether your wife could have done what she did otherwise than by accident. You must know her personality, her state of mind, if she was worried about anything...Any eccentricities of behaviour, for instance.”
“I don’t know. I’d have to think about that.”
“Yes, do, sir.”
Purbright leaned back a couple of inches and gazed blandly at his tumbler. He tipped it gently to one side, then the other, and watched the fine oily rivulets of spirit creep down the glass.
“It’s funny, you know,” Palgrove said at last, “but I shouldn’t be surprised if there was something in what you say.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean you to...”
Palgrove held up his hand. “No, I know you didn’t. Facts are facts, though. And I can’t pretend that Henny’s attitude to things was altogether normal. She had these terrific enthusiasms, you know. It seemed sometimes that animals meant more to her than human beings. It was her kindness, really, I suppose. I mean, I wouldn’t knock her for that. Not now. But she got so worked up about these things. Perhaps I should have seen that there was a danger of her—you know—sort of going over the top.”
“Did Mrs Palgrove do much letter writing, sir?”
“Lord, you can say that again. You certainly can. She was forever writing letters. Mind you, she was on committees galore.”
“So I understand. I wasn’t thinking so much of formal correspondence, though. Have you ever known her to write a—what shall I say?—an excitable sort of letter?”
“To be quite honest, I never took that much interest. She’d be capable of it, though. I’m sure she would. She was an excitable sort of woman.” Palgrove paused to eye the inspector carefully. “Why, has something of that kind...?”
“It was a hypothetical question, sir. I’m just trying to get a general idea of your wife’s temperament.”
Palgrove looked at his glass, empty now. He stretched and flexed his shoulders. “Can I get you another drink, Inspector?”
“No, thank you, sir. We’ll have to be getting back.”
Palgrove went to pour a second whiskey for himself. He spoke over his shoulder. “This inquest thing...”
“Yes, sir?”
“I suppose I ought to get my solicitor on the job.”
“That’s a matter for you to decide, Mr Palgrove. He would accompany you if you wished, I’m sure.”
“I’ll have to think about it.” He drank his whiskey at one steady tilt, then smacked his lips. He stood the glass on the top of the cabinet, paused, picked it up again and walked with it in his hand to the door, where the two policemen were already waiting. He smiled wryly at them, showed them the glass. “My own washer-up from now on, I suppose.”
Seated in The Widow on its sedate return run to the police station, Love said to the inspector: “What do you make of Pally, then?”
“What do you think I should make of him?”
“I reckon he’s a bit of a rum bugger.”
“You could be right.”
“They say he’s rattling some tottie from Jubilee Park way.”
“That’s one thing I admire about you, Sid—you have an eye for geographical detail.”
“You don’t really believe his wife did herself in, do you?”
“No, I don’t. But it was very interesting to see how appealing a theory Mr Palgrove found it, once it was suggested.”
Chapter Nine
The offices of the Flaxborough and Eastern Counties Charities Alliance were on the first floor of what once had been the town house of a Georgian wine merchant. They were reached by narrow stairs from a door between a chemist’s shop and an ironmonger’s. The door was surmounted by a semi-circular fanlight and flanked by narrow fluted pillars; traces of its original mouldings were just discernible as depressions and swellings in the build-up of countless layers of paint.
Mr Hive sniffed as he climbed the steep, uneven stairs. The smell of kerosene from the hardware shop contended with whiffs of cosmetics and cough syrup from the chemist’s. Near the top, though, another, more pungent, aroma asserted itself. Hive paused to savour it. He smiled.
He arrived at a broad landing flooded with light from a ten-feet-high window. There were three doors. On one of them he read: FECCA—Secretary and Accounts. He knocked, then softly pushed it open a few inches, enough to introduce one cautious, reconnoitring eye. This he withdrew after a moment or two.
“I said come in.” A woman’s voice, querulous, refined.
Hive reached something from his pocket—a small squat bottle—and, remaining himself out of sight, dangled it between finger and thumb just inside the room.
Miss Lucilla Edith Cavell Teatime pushed her basket chair back from the table and half rose, staring at the quartern-sized apparition that had floated through the door. She read its label. Highland Fling. Resolutely, Miss Teatime walked to the door and pulled it fully open.
“Mortimer!”
“Lucy!”
The bottle of whiskey hung disregarded on the periphery of their embrace. Then, stepping back, Mr Hive presented it to Miss Teatime with a deep bow.
She stood regarding him fondly. “How sweet of you, Mortimer, to remember my little twinges.”